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3.67 AVERAGE
3.67 AVERAGE
dark
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
As another reviewer said, this is a book about “terrible people doing terrible things.” This novel features dark, heavy subject matter involving teens and animals, so check trigger warnings before reading and know that this is a duology and ends inconclusively.
1.5 but I’m angry at it so rounding down. rtc in a bit probably.
~*~*~*~
How many plot points does a book need? Having multiple subplots intertwined throughout the main story, dovetailing back and forth to create a cohesive beautiful whole, even when the story is horror and gruesome should work.
But this book has Killer Flu (do not read in the time of the Backstreet Boys Reunion Tour), stalking murder panthers [with its own perspective bad poetry chapters WHY], a worldwide mocking livestream in which a teen boy strips naked by the end and starts twirling his bits to the chiming of a clock on instagram, animal abuse, date-rape (technically she isn't raped but she's given drugs and is seconds away from non-consensual consent if not for the "good" timing of a seizure), infidelity, gaslighting for the sake of keeping up the family appearances, more alcohol than a liquor store, bouncing timelines that go as far back as kindergarten, all shoved into an Edgar Allen Poe story retelling in which a girl is bricking up her former friend in a coal chute while trying to find out what happened to her parents.
Oh and the dog dies.
Picking two or three of the other things to intertwine in there would have been nice. All of them at once? Ridiculously convoluted. Not hard to follow, but lacking weight. Stuff just happens, and everything goes along with it. It's so busy, it's so hectic, it's just one big distraction for padding. This should have been a short story like the original story it's riffing from.
This should have been so much shorter. We didn't need to go all the way back to kindergarten.
The "it's my fault I deserve this" shtick wouldn't have felt so limp if it hadn't been there so much.
McGinnis seems to think that gross-out things mean impact. The amount of bodily fluids in this book is enough to drown in. So much gore, so much vomit, so much urine. This is slasher level horror, and yet I really don't think the book itself needed so much. It's gratuitous at a point, and pointlessly numbing when she slips in her own urine. Like. We get it, this is awful.
If you're going to use a gimmick like having text bubbles, make sure they're formatted correctly. I found an instant where the protagonist's texts were on the left instead of the right like they're supposed to be. Just don't bother if you're going to do it wrong, it's a waste of time and confusing.
I haven't read Cask of Amontillado in a really long time. Like, decade long time, if not longer. But it's what all the kids read in their junior levels English, probably, so it's a good story to adapt. Well known. I remember the memes from a few years back and so does everyone else.
All the Poe references like the Mask of Red Death and the Pendulum (and i grudgingly guess the cat) were nice little touches though.
Does not need a sequel. Do not need to drag it out. I suppose it's because we don't know who carried her away from the scene, and there are airholes in the mortar so she can conceivably live to the next book for a proper explanation of what happened, but it's unneeded. Just. Tell the story in one book. Maybe removing some of the extraneous junk would have given you the room for it.
I admit to hate reading the last third and I was looking for a fight, but the book didn't have to make it that easy to annoy me.
~*~*~*~
How many plot points does a book need? Having multiple subplots intertwined throughout the main story, dovetailing back and forth to create a cohesive beautiful whole, even when the story is horror and gruesome should work.
But this book has Killer Flu (do not read in the time of the Backstreet Boys Reunion Tour), stalking murder panthers [with its own perspective bad poetry chapters WHY], a worldwide mocking livestream in which a teen boy strips naked by the end and starts twirling his bits to the chiming of a clock on instagram, animal abuse, date-rape (technically she isn't raped but she's given drugs and is seconds away from non-consensual consent if not for the "good" timing of a seizure), infidelity, gaslighting for the sake of keeping up the family appearances, more alcohol than a liquor store, bouncing timelines that go as far back as kindergarten, all shoved into an Edgar Allen Poe story retelling in which a girl is bricking up her former friend in a coal chute while trying to find out what happened to her parents.
Oh and the dog dies.
Picking two or three of the other things to intertwine in there would have been nice. All of them at once? Ridiculously convoluted. Not hard to follow, but lacking weight. Stuff just happens, and everything goes along with it. It's so busy, it's so hectic, it's just one big distraction for padding. This should have been a short story like the original story it's riffing from.
This should have been so much shorter. We didn't need to go all the way back to kindergarten.
The "it's my fault I deserve this" shtick wouldn't have felt so limp if it hadn't been there so much.
McGinnis seems to think that gross-out things mean impact. The amount of bodily fluids in this book is enough to drown in. So much gore, so much vomit, so much urine. This is slasher level horror, and yet I really don't think the book itself needed so much. It's gratuitous at a point, and pointlessly numbing when she slips in her own urine. Like. We get it, this is awful.
If you're going to use a gimmick like having text bubbles, make sure they're formatted correctly. I found an instant where the protagonist's texts were on the left instead of the right like they're supposed to be. Just don't bother if you're going to do it wrong, it's a waste of time and confusing.
I haven't read Cask of Amontillado in a really long time. Like, decade long time, if not longer. But it's what all the kids read in their junior levels English, probably, so it's a good story to adapt. Well known. I remember the memes from a few years back and so does everyone else.
All the Poe references like the Mask of Red Death and the Pendulum (and i grudgingly guess the cat) were nice little touches though.
Does not need a sequel. Do not need to drag it out. I suppose it's because we don't know who carried her away from the scene, and there are airholes in the mortar so she can conceivably live to the next book for a proper explanation of what happened, but it's unneeded. Just. Tell the story in one book. Maybe removing some of the extraneous junk would have given you the room for it.
I admit to hate reading the last third and I was looking for a fight, but the book didn't have to make it that easy to annoy me.
dark
hopeful
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This is one of those books where you can confidently say - WTF was that ending??? Why why why???
This book grew on me as this author does ( I more and more love her books ) and I honestly liked both Tress and Felicity, especially more we learn about the girls… but the whole thing about basement and brick wall… the whole thing aboutburying your “friend” alive and actually finishing it… the ending gave me goosebumps!
This book grew on me as this author does ( I more and more love her books ) and I honestly liked both Tress and Felicity, especially more we learn about the girls… but the whole thing about basement and brick wall… the whole thing about
This is definitely one of those sit-at-the-edge-of-your-seat-clutching-the-book kind of reads. And that end just killed me dead.
why was one of the povs a wild panther and also why did nothing actually get answered ❤️
I appreciate that Mindy McGinnis tries on so many different genres, although some definitely work better than the others. The Initial Insult feels like a blend between the Netflix documentary Tiger King and Edgar Allan Poe (although I must confess that I haven't read the stories that the book seems to take inspiration from, I've only seen the other reviews that reference them).
The book is certainly a very strange one, about the breakdown of a friendship between two girls and the mystery of what happened years ago lying in the background like a trap that will spring anytime. Not to mention, one of the girl's best idea for how to get revenge on the other is to attempt to entomb the other to get the truth out of her. And in the background, there's a panther on the prowl and on the loose that's somehow tied to the story.
The book alternates between Felicity and Tress' perspectives, who were formerly best friends until Tress' parents disappeared on the night that they were taking Felicity home. Only Felicity was found but there's a missing gap in her memories about what happened that night. And in the aftermath, Tress was forced to live with her neglectful hateful grandfather, Cecil, and became the laughingstock of the town.
Tress
While Tress knows exactly who to blame for her troubles, Felicity has been facing her own failures everyday - for not being the daughter that her mother would've wanted. And even though Tress is a social recluse, her family continues to mean something to their town.
Felicity
Felicity blames herself most of all because of how Tress has ended up now - parentless and with a spiky ball of hate at the center of her.
When Felicity and Tress attend the last house party at an abandoned house, Tress carries out her plan to force the truth out of Felicity. The book was definitely a weird one because aside from the already somewhat bizarre plot of Tress entombing Felicity, there are multiple other strange plot threads such as the panther running around and a supposedly contagious flu spreading in their towns.
However, the strangeness of the book isn't the reason why I've given the book an average rating. Instead, that's because I was a little frustrated that the premise is about the disappearance of the Montors, Tress' parents, but Tress ends up taking out her anger on Felicity for other smaller slights such as leaving Tress behind as a social pariah. I'll still be back for the next book though because I genuinely want to find out what happened and this book ends off with a cliffhanger that I'm interested to see resolved.
The book is certainly a very strange one, about the breakdown of a friendship between two girls and the mystery of what happened years ago lying in the background like a trap that will spring anytime. Not to mention, one of the girl's best idea for how to get revenge on the other is to attempt to entomb the other to get the truth out of her. And in the background, there's a panther on the prowl and on the loose that's somehow tied to the story.
The book alternates between Felicity and Tress' perspectives, who were formerly best friends until Tress' parents disappeared on the night that they were taking Felicity home. Only Felicity was found but there's a missing gap in her memories about what happened that night. And in the aftermath, Tress was forced to live with her neglectful hateful grandfather, Cecil, and became the laughingstock of the town.
Tress
"Nice sign," Ribbit had said when he put the truck in reverse, ready to head back to the Usher house, down the road. I hadn't noticed it until he pointed it out, our sign being something I looked at every day but never really saw, like Cecil's milky eye rolling in its socket. The spray paint was new enough to still be shiny but old enough to have soaked in. Days, then. For days people down in town had likely been laughing, and me driving right past it in Cecil's old truck, coming home from school to feed the animals their bloody, raw-meat dinners, not seeing it. Not seeing the insult, painted in bright red right at my doorstep.
Cecil had raised his ball cap and scratched his head, honestly stumped. "Who would go and do a thing like that?"
I know. I know exactly who.
While Tress knows exactly who to blame for her troubles, Felicity has been facing her own failures everyday - for not being the daughter that her mother would've wanted. And even though Tress is a social recluse, her family continues to mean something to their town.
Felicity
Of course, new blood means your family hasn't been around for at least five generations. Time carries more weight than money in Amontillado, something Gretchen Astor enjoys reminding me of every time we pass the stone pillar in the center of town with the founding fathers' names inscribed: Allan. Astor. Montor. Usher.
I'd like to think she's not doing it on purpose, that maybe running her fingers over her last name as we walk by is an unconscious movement, something she'd learned from watching her parents, who worship at the altar of their surname and expect the rest of us to as well. But everything I know of Gretchen is careful and calculated, and despite my money - and we do have it - this is her silently reminding me that Turnado isn't up there and never will be.
Felicity blames herself most of all because of how Tress has ended up now - parentless and with a spiky ball of hate at the center of her.
When Felicity and Tress attend the last house party at an abandoned house, Tress carries out her plan to force the truth out of Felicity. The book was definitely a weird one because aside from the already somewhat bizarre plot of Tress entombing Felicity, there are multiple other strange plot threads such as the panther running around and a supposedly contagious flu spreading in their towns.
Spoiler
Not to mention, Tress' cousin Ribbit is a chronic people-pleaser and the other party-goers have decided that the highest form of entertainment is to get him drunk, put him on social media and ask him to answer questions honestly.However, the strangeness of the book isn't the reason why I've given the book an average rating. Instead, that's because I was a little frustrated that the premise is about the disappearance of the Montors, Tress' parents, but Tress ends up taking out her anger on Felicity for other smaller slights such as leaving Tress behind as a social pariah. I'll still be back for the next book though because I genuinely want to find out what happened and this book ends off with a cliffhanger that I'm interested to see resolved.
Well that was definitely a good creepy read to get Halloween season kicked off! I really enjoyed the dual POV and the flash backs. The ending is crazy. I won't forget this one anytime soon.